The documentary on “Killing Us Softly” by Jean Killbourne, shows very profound messages being created in the advertising world, and how they market their products in not so subtle and subliminal ways in regards to women as well as men. Killbourne makes the case in the revealing of various commercial and magazine ads designed to market products in a very artificial and sexual way. She has done this research since 1960 by collection of ads, and has created four editions to her “Killing Us Softly” documentaries. She says that not only has the media not changed in the way they do advertising, but it has in fact gotten much worse. Women, men, and children are still being objectified in these media ads. Women are depicted as skinny, flawless and defenseless in ads that bombard us on a daily basis. As young gals or guys “take in” these ads they show us what societies values are in regards to love, sex, normalcy, and tell us who we are and how are we “supposed to look”.
Here are a few staggering statistics on ad placements and how much they truly bombarding us. Produced are 250 million advertisements a year in America alone. In an Americans life time, a person will view 2 years worth of commercials on television and even on the cinema screens. Not only are these advertisements displayed on our television sets, they are also placed on billboards, buses, bus stops, and splattered all over sports stadiums. It has been said and researched that only 8% of these “messages” are received through our brain waves consciously. The rest are stored away in our subconscious to be “figured out” and processed. 91% of surgeries that are performed are plastic and enhancement based. 450% of these surgeries have gone up over the years and 754% are Botox procedures. Besides the procedures that are being performed at an alarming rate, ads are being placed for enhancement of breast products, such as a one called Natrelle breast implants. Even the bras that support such breasts are marketed to enhance or push up and make them look bigger, such as the Wonderbra.
The affects of these advertisements are not positive, especially for young ladies and women. As teen as girls “take in” the ads, they are taught that they are not accepted unless they are big breasted and very skinny. Not to mention they have to look perfect in every way. However, what these innocent and naïve girls do not know is that these ads are not being true and in fact a lot of the images are airbrushed and photo shopped to look as perfect as they can possibly achieve. In trying to fit the standards by which these ads are selling, young girls are starving themselves to look “perfect” and the diet ads that are placed are not helping matters. Everywhere you look there is a Jenny Craig ad placed alongside a celebrity as their spokesperson, who was overweight, but now is thin and even more gorgeous than before, and if that was not enough, there are products sold for young babies with T-shirts that display the words “Pimp Squad” or the selling of high heels to infant girls. Even thong bikinis are being sold for 7 year old girls and the mothers are buying them up. Thus, teaching these young girls about their sexuality early on and before they are even knowing what the word sex even means.
The one thing that is resulting as time as gone by are the fact that the fashion industry is “waking up” and realizing that their models do not have to be a certain size in order to sell their clothing. In Madrid only models of a certain size can be used and in Germany the magazine Brigette no more professional models are used. The author states that by only making people aware of affects on public health and so on can changes be made in the advertising industry. A wonderful campaign ran by Dove is an ad about a “normal looking” female being transformed to look “perfect”. More ads like these can change the way the consumers are “taking in” these ads and maybe change the thought before purchasing a product or perhaps not buying said product, but the choice is always the consumers.
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